Mr. Mikhlin pleaded guilty to felony counts of conspiracy, obtaining opioids by fraud and deceit, receiving illegal kickbacks after sending urine specimens to a laboratory for unnecessary testing and causing Medicare and Medicaid to pay $4.7 million for unnecessary prescription drugs and drug tests.
Prosecutors say Mr. Mikhlin worked with physicians to write illegal prescriptions for opioids and other drugs to patients who had no medical need for them. He also recruited patients and paid them so he could use their names on the fraudulent prescriptions. Prosecutors say he and his accomplices obscured the unlawful activities by creating files that falsely reported patients had been examined and were consistently monitored by the prescribing physicians.
Along with his sentence, Mr. Mikhlin was ordered to pay an undisclosed amount of restitution.
He was among 12 people, including two physicians and a chiropractor, indicted in 2020 in connection with the scheme. Six others have pleaded guilty and will face sentencing in March, according to the Department of Justice.
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